I’ve been a little nervous since hearing where Neal Stephenson is going with his next book, Quicksilver. Maybe a “prequel” to the immensely satisfying, massive Cryptonomicon would work, but what’s one of the more ingenious science fiction writers operating going to do way back in the Baroque era? He seems to be trying to escape his genre roots, and I hope he isn’t shooting himself in the foot by doing so. (It does charm me that he’s gone all the way retro by writing the book by hand with a fountain pen; I am an aficionado of fine pens and write with them day in day out in my work.) This preview helps me feel I could get into it, though. Too bad it’ll be too late for summer reading.